To Build a Home
by NorvegianWood3
Summary: It all started with a bruised knee on a summer day.
1. Chapter 1

**NOTE:**

The first two parts of this story were originally posted as one-shots several months ago. I didn't plan on writing a multichapter story, but after I finished the second one-shot, the story kept on writing itself. This first chapter was originally called Sherlock and the Witch, while the next one kept its title; Thunderstorm. If you already read them, you can skip to Chapter Three, which I'll post in a couple of days. :) Otherwise, sit comfortably, have a cookie, and enjoy your ride.

This one is for alectheta. Thank you for all the help, the fun and the friendship.

 _There is a house built out of stone_  
 _Wooden floors, walls and window sills_  
 _Tables and chairs worn by all of the dust_  
 _This is a place where I don't feel alone_  
 _This is a place where I feel at home._ _-The Cinematic Orchestra, To Build a Home_

 **Charlcombe, Somerset**  
 **July 1985**

The girl reminded him of a little witch. With her long dark curls, high cheekbones, and eyes of an indefinite greyish-blue colour, she didn't resemble any of his classmates.

After checking her bike, he tugged at the chain to show her how it had slipped off. "Needs to be changed," he decreed in a confident voice.

"Oh," she said. A deep crease had appeared between her eyebrows.

He had noticed the small figure pushing a bike up the slope outside their cottage during his afternoon break. The sun was scorching, and Alec had debated whether the girl was worth leaving the Raymond Chandler book he was reading, but in the end curiosity had won the upper hand. He had seen her around several times, riding that red bike, sitting in the grass scribbling on a notepad, climbing trees. Always on her own. His mother had told him that she was the daughter of the family that had rented the Hawksdale Cottage up the hill.

He had overcome his shyness and diffidence toward girls and had approached her and asked if she needed any help. She had stared at him with a frown for a while. Then, she had shrugged and pointed at the pedals. "They suddenly got loose."

She must have fallen, because her left knee was dirty and scratched. Alec was about to suggest to have it cleaned as soon as possible, but gave up after he met her stern eyes.

Alec led her over to the shade of an oak and crouched over the dusty bike. "That's not hard to repair," he said. "Probably your father..."

The girl shook her head. "He's busy," she murmured, as if talking to herself. She suddenly stood up and brushed off her hands on her shorts. "But thank you; at least now I know what the matter with this rattletrap is." She smiled, but her smile had something sad. It made Alec wonder if she wasn't older than she looked.

He watched her walk away and thought that maybe he should have offered to repair it for her.

That night a soft rain wrapped the countryside in a grey, hazy shawl. Alec finished reading his book, started another one and ate some apple pie just to have a reason to take a break from reading for half an hour. On the morning of the third day, he was so bored he decided to go downtown to buy groceries for his mother.

The shops on Main Street were almost deserted, so he spotted the strange girl at once. She was sitting inside The Green Rocket - Charlcombe's one and only cafe - scribbling on a notepad. Her chin rested on the palm of her hand and she seemed completely unaware of her surroundings. As if to contradict him, she glanced up a few seconds later and looked at him through the glass window. His ears turned red when she caught him staring and he felt the urge to leave, but she had clearly recognized him and he didn't want to appear even more uncool. Besides, she was just a little girl.

He stepped into the cafe, and the girl closed her notepad and smiled at him while she took her backpack from the chair next to her so he could sit down. He ordered a macchiato, but if his adult beverage impressed her, she didn't show it.

"Hello, how's your bike?" He inquired, only half interested.

She shrugged. "In the barn, still broken."

"I'm sorry."

"Awww, thank you. I'll tell her you asked after her."

Was she teasing him? God, he couldn't stand girls. He frowned and tasted his coffee. It burned his tongue, but he pretended to savour it. "Were you writing something?" he asked, crossing his arms and lounging on the chair.

She shook her head. "Drawing."

"Can I see?"

"No way. I'm Tess, by the way." She extended her hand.

He shook it. "Alec."

"Weird name."

"It's Scottish."

"Yes, you sound quite Scottish."

"Do I?"

"Aye." She smiled again.

"You are staying at the Hawksdale Cottage, right?"

"Yes, with Mum and Phil. Do you live here?"

"Oh no, I'm from Glasgow. My mother got the cottage down the hill from her family and we're spending a few weeks there."

He hadn't asked about Phil and she didn't ask about his father. He was glad she wasn't a chatterbox as many of the girls in his class were, but she wasn't like his mate Brian either: she kept staring at him in a way that made the skin on the back of his neck prickle. His younger self would have wondered whether that girl wasn't really a witch. Also, her accent was quite posh, and the cottage up the hill was one of the fanciest in Charlcombe, but with her shorts and battered Converse, she didn't look like a rich girl.

When he spoke again, it was mainly to escape her piercing blue-grey eyes. "I can have a look at that chain, if you want."

She gaped at him. "Would you?"

For a terrible moment Alec feared that she would reach across the table to hug him, but she regained her composure almost at once and said, "I mean, if it's not too much of a hassle."

Alec sneered. "That's ok. Just tell me when I can drop in at your place."

Tess bit her upper lip. "What if I bring you the bike instead?"

He though it was a bit strange for a girl her age to be so willing to go to a stranger's house, but didn't say anything. They agreed she would bring the bike to his garage that same afternoon.

"Bloody pin..." Alec kept hitting it with the handle of the screwdriver, hoping behind hope to manage to loose the damaged chain-pin. His hands were dirty with black grease and his forehead sweaty. He casted an anxious sideways glance at Tess.

The girl was sitting on her haunches in front of him, absorbed in contemplation of an old wrench.

"I'd need a chain tool," he blurted out, knowing that his cheeks were getting red and that there wasn't anything he could do to prevent it. Why the hell had he told her he was able to fix her stupid bike?

"I'll buy it for you," Tess said and jumped up.

"Now?"

"Yes? There is a hardware store near the church, isn't there? They should have it."

She really wanted that bike fixed. Alec wondered why her stepfather, or whoever that Phil was, had done nothing to help her. "Tess, it's raining pretty hard."

She raised her eyes to the garage roof as if to gauge the noise of the rain, then - defeated - dropped her shoulders. "Yeah. Sorry, I'm kind of pestering you. May... may I just wait for the rain to lessen a bit before I leave?"

Alec knew he had tried his best, but felt as he had let her down and the idea made him sad. Which was weird since he barely knew her. "Sure. There, sit wherever you want. I'll fetch us a coke."

He ran a hand through his hair and disappeared through the adjoining door.

When he came back with two tall glasses of coke, Tess seemed to be in a better mood. She was looking at the stack of books Alec had brought from home with her hands clasped behind her back.

"You like detective novels," she said, taking her drink from him.

"Sort of."

"You want to become a detective?" There wasn't trace of mocking in her voice; she sounded genuinely curious.

Alec shrugged. "I don't know. Sometimes I think I should just get a job and help my mother. It's not like I have any special talent, anyway." He tried to keep his cool, but thoughts like this kept on gnawing at him since his father had left. His mother hadn't obtained a divorce from his father yet, so he wasn't bound to give them a penny. She had never told him, but Alec knew that she was picking up extra shifts at the convenience store where she worked. He was about to turn fourteen, and - running after his books and dreams - felt like a parasite.

"I don't know you enough to tell whether you're a genius, but you sure are a kind guy. A lousy but kind mechanic." Under the harsh neon light, her eyes had hazel sparks.

"Oi!"

She grinned and stuck her tongue out at him.

"You are really fond of that bike, aren't you?" It felt strange to feel so relaxed talking to a girl he had just met, but he felt compelled to find out more about her.

"Not really." Tess' smile faded, and she started to play with the pages of a book. "It was just... useful for a little project I had."

"What kind of project?"

She shook her head and scowled. "It was stupid. Maybe it's a good thing that the old piece of junk broke."

Alec finished his drink in silence, giving her time in case she felt like saying more.

"I need it to get to Swainswick and back without my family knowing."

"What's in Swainswick?"

Tess closed the book and looked straight at him. "An art competition."

Right, he had seen her sketching. He chose his next words carefully, sensing he was walking on eggshells. "And you needed your bike to submit your contribution."

"That's correct, Sherlock."

"But why don't you want your family to know?"

Tess cleared her throat and crossed her arms in front of her chest.

Alec raised his eyebrows.

"I'm never going to win anyway, so why bother them. Listen, you don't have to help me."

"Oh, shut up. I'll go get the chain tool first thing tomorrow and I'll try to get old rattletrap fixed before lunch. Either that or you could borrow my mother's bike. When's the deadline for submissions?"

"8 pm the day after tomorrow. But I got to be back home before 7 pm."

"We'll make it."

She flashed him a smile, her eyes sparkling with mischievous excitement. They agreed to meet under the big oak the following afternoon.

Tess thanked him again, and before he could offer her an umbrella she was scrambling up the hill in the rain like a dark fairy.

At dinner, Alec tried to find out more.

Since he hadn't made any friends in the village, his mother was his only source of information about the family living at the Hawksdale. However, all he managed to gather from her was that there weren't any siblings, and that nobody seemed to have ever seen the mother. The dad, Phil Curtis, was thought to be a London broker, but Mrs Hardy had never talked to him and she wasn't sure about the source of the gossip.

"What does he look like?" Alec urged her on.

She stood up and started to clear the table. "I'm not sure, darling. Let's see... Mid forties, tall, blondish, wears neon polo shirts? But why bother with the father when it's the daughter you're interested in?" She added with a wink, passing him a pile of plates.

"I'm just helping her with a project. And I don't think Mr Curtis is her father."

But his mother didn't relent. "Whatever. She's cute as a button anyway, isn't she?"

Alec frowned, hoping to look more grown up than he felt. "She's just a kid, mum. And a weird one at that."

Mrs Hardy chuckled, and - as he went to his room - Alec felt he had lost a battle.

"That's brilliant!" Tess cried, riding her bike in circles around him, her arms dangling at her sides.

The rain of the previous days had cleaned the air, and that afternoon the sun blazed bright in a blue sky.

Alec had worked hard to get that chain fixed; even with the chain tool the task had turned out to be a pain in the arse, but he was proud of the outcome. He grinned, carried away by his friend's enthusiasm.

When she got off the bike and sat near him, her cheeks were flushed and strands of dark curls were sticking to her forehead. She smiled at him, and he had to divert his eyes to the grass blade he had just picked.

"Can I see your painting?"

"I'd prefer if you didn't. I'm really just a beginner."

Alec was crestfallen. After all he had done to help her, he thought he had at least won enough of her trust to see her work. "What kind of competition is that, anyway? One for kids?" He snapped.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her pucker her lips. "How old do you think I am?"

"Dunno. Ten?" That was mean, but he thought she deserved it.

She glared at him. "I'm twelve."

Alec whistled. He heard her rummaging in her backpack, and a moment later a cardboard folder landed on his lap. He opened it and there it was: a delicate watercolour of the tiny lake of Charlcombe. Alec wasn't an art expert, but to him it was beautiful. The turquoise water and the yellow dandelions she had painted on the bank seemed to blend in a sort of hazy halo, giving the well-known view a dreamlike atmosphere.

"Tess, this is amazing. You really did it yourself?"

Her lips were pressed into a stubborn line.

Alec tried a more cautious approach. "Why haven't you painted your cottage though? From what I remember, it's pretty... picturesque."

"Because I hate it."

"Is it because of your family? The reason why you didn't want me to come check your bike there?"

Tess' shoulders stiffened. "I don't want to talk about it."

Alec nodded, knowing how she felt. The memory of the never-ending sessions with Mrs Petrov after his dad's flight from home last winter still made him cringe. He knew the chubby school counsellor meant no harm, but the last thing Alec had needed during those weeks was to answer to her corny questions about love and abandonment.

Yet, there was one thing he had to know. Trying to ignore his sweaty palms, he spoke as casually as he could. "Phil... is your step-father, right?"

She turned to look at him, an eyebrow raised.

"Is he... rough with you?"

She chuckled, but it didn't sound like a laugh. "Oh Alec. Nope, Phil - my stepfather - never laid a hand on me." After a beat of silence, she hugged her knees and stared straight in front of her. "That would be too much of a bother for him. As long as I keep what in your books would be called a low profile and I'm on time for dinner, I guess Phil and I get along fine."

"He doesn't want you around?"

"He's ok, really. And loves my mother. Just what happened kind of..." She bit her lips. "Shattered them."

"What was that?"

"My little brother's death."

Alec wasn't aware he was holding his breath until he released it. "Holy shit."

"He got sick last year just after I started school and died three months ago. Leukaemia. Everybody loved Cullen so much; he was just a happy bouncing thing who never would have hurt anyone."

"How old was he?"

"He would have turned four three weeks ago."

"Tess I'm so..."

"I'm still so angry and sad that he had to die so young, but..." Her voice caught and she rested her forehead on her knees. "But sometimes I just want to be happy and laugh and ride my bike fast. And I think this is wrong, I think I should hurt more and spend my days in bed like mum does. I think I'm a bad person and maybe it was me who should have died in his place."

Alec did a thing he had never done before: he put an arm around another person's shoulders. He felt her stiffen at first, then relax a bit and sniff. He rubbed Tess' slender arm awkwardly, surprised to find himself fighting a giant knot at the back of his throat. Now everything made sense: her spending so much time out and about, her reticence about bringing people home.

An absurd thought formed in his mind: 'I want to keep being there for you'.

"Is that why you started to draw? 'Cause it was something you could do away from home?"

She shook her head. "My mother is... she was an art teacher, and we used to sketch together when I was little. I was never any good, but I thought that if I won that stupid contest maybe she would be happy. And you know, proud of me."

Alec winced. He had felt the same way towards his father countless times. Striving to make him proud, to be good enough for him, and always failing. He sensed those kind of goals were unattainable, yet he wanted to help Tess.

"I think you are talented. You could make it."

She lifted her red puffy face. "Yeah?"

"Aye."

She elbowed him. "Sop."

"Oi!"

She stood, drying her eyes with the back of her hand and smiling down at him. "Then I'll submit my masterpiece tomorrow."

"What time are you leaving?"

"I don't know. Have to have lunch at home, so I guess early afternoon. Fancy a trip to Swainswick?"

Alec shrugged. He did, but he really wished she'd stop smiling at him like that. It made him feel sort of uncomfortable. "2pm?"

"Deal. And thank you for listening, Alec." Without giving him time to reply, she got on her bike and left.

Alec felt quite clumsy riding his mother's lilac bike. He had grown about four inches over the last six months, and now he felt he had too much leg and arm and most of the time wasn't sure what to do with them. He circled their cottage a couple of times, and when he felt marginally more confident about his biking skills headed off to meet Tess.

Despite this, she chuckled when she saw him. He rolled his eyes and led the way out of town. They rode on dirt roads in comfortable silence through green fields and small clusters of houses, enjoying the fresh air and the high, endless sky. She had brought a pack of cookies and two bottles of soda, so about midway they sat on a stone wall to rest and have a snack.

"Hey Sherlock?"

"Stop calling me that, please."

"Do you think that I will make a fool of myself with my little painting?"

"No."

"Do you reckon I could win?"

"I have no idea, Tess. I like your painting very much, but I don't know how good the other participants are going to be."

She nodded and threw cookie crumbs to a grey duck that had come to observe them from a nearby pond.

"But the point is another. I don't think you should try to earn your mother's love by winning a competition." It was tough talking about these things, but for once the need to say something was stronger than the difficulty to voice it. "I think she should, and I would, be proud of you for trying and doing your best."

"Phil rented the cottage to speed up her recovery; clean air, nature, and stuff like that. But she still spends almost all her days in bed, sleeping or watching the telly. Sometimes he shuts himself in the bedroom with her, and I can hear them arguing. I wasn't supposed to come with them you know, I was supposed to stay with my father in London, but he got an important project at work at the very last minute. Phil got spectacularly mad at him."

"What a prick."

Tess sneered, creasing her brow. "Who?"

"Both. Listen, I'm sure your mother loves you very much. What happened to her was terrible, she just needs some time." Fearing that he had said too much, Alec jumped off the fence and ran away with his bike, leaving a disgruntled Tess behind.

He slowed down almost at once, waiting for her to catch up on him, but she didn't. Muttering under his breath, he stopped. "Tess? We're already late."

He could see her pushing her bike, walking so slowly she almost stood still. Her head was craned back, and if she heard him she didn't acknowledge it.

"Bloody girls. Oi?"

"Houston, we have a problem." She sounded tense and still wasn't looking at him.

Torn between annoyance and worry, Alec rode back to her. The source of the problem seemed to be the young duck she had just fed, which had no intention to stop following her.

Tess was hissing at it to go away, but the little thing kept trudging after her bike.

Alec chuckled. "It thinks you're its mum."

"Will you shut up?"

"Oooh, someone is being prickly!"

"You're not helping much."

"Just ignore it."

"But it will follow me, get lost, and die of starvation alone and far from its family."

"Geez, Tess."

Alec tried to shoo it away himself, but the duck relented only a few inches.

"See?"

"I think we'll have to run. Its legs are shorter than yours, I doubt it is a good sprinter."

Tess glared at him and got on her bike. However, her voice was low and sweet when she spoke to her new feathery friend. "So I guess that's a farewell, little duck. Take care of yourself and think of me sometimes, will you?"

Her wistful voice brought him a sudden pang of sadness. But there wasn't the time to dwell on it, since a moment later she was sprinting down the dirt road.

They sped on their bikes, raising clouds of dust, until they were forced to a screeching halt in front of a bale of hay in the middle of the road. They leaned against it; laughing so hard they had troubles catching their breath.

The rest of the trip was quieter. Alec waited outside Swainswick City Hall as Tess submitted her work and, as they started their journey back, he asked when and where they were going to announce the winners.

"Couple of weeks, in the local newspaper."

"Oh. Hope I'll still be here, then."

"What do you mean?"

"Mum has to go back to work by the beginning of August."

Tess scrunched up her face and nodded.

He opened his mouth to say something but couldn't find the words. The deafening silence marked the whole journey back. When they finally arrived at the bottom of their hill, the shadows had turned long and sharp, and the lights inside Alec's cottage were on.

"Are you going to be on time for dinner?" He asked.

"Aye," she smiled. "Thank you for the company. It has been an interesting ride."

"Same here. See you around?"

"Yeah. And Alec?"

"Uh?" He was already fumbling with the gate to the garden.

"I may look like a duck, but you look like a stick insect."

Alec smiled and shook his head, amazed. She had a point.

They spent the following days together. Tess borrowed a couple of his books and managed to guess who the murder was both times, and they just hung out with each other: they read, chatted, hiked, and bickered.

They were resting under the old oak after they had helped his mother hang up the laundry when Tess handed him a newspaper cutting with the results of the competition.

She wasn't among the three winners.

"Fuckwits," he said and crumpled the piece of paper in his hand.

To his surprise, Tess was smiling. "Wankers!"

"Lavy heid."

She gaped at him.

"It means toilet head."

They both snorted. Alec looked at the branches swaying in the breeze and wished time could stop. The light, which had been blinding a few minutes earlier, was getting soft and painted the clouds orange, pink and gold. The days were getting shorter, gnawed on by dark humid nights. In forty-eight hours he would be back in his old room in the outskirts of Glasgow, those sounds and smells - crickets chirping, footfalls on wet grass, a dog barking in the distance - just a memory. But most of all, he didn't like to imagine her on her own in that cottage up the hill.

Again, that absurd thought. 'I want to keep being there for you'.

He had seen his father yelling at his mother and had felt powerless and angry. He had been happy to see him leave their home, no matter how tight the money was, but the burning shame of having done nothing to protect his mother hadn't gone away. He was glad he got the chance to help Tess, to do something for her. He hoped he had been able to make her feel safe, protected and a little less lonely.

He closed his eyes. Maybe that was what he wanted to do: to help those who were struggling, weak or forgotten. All his books, all the time spent worrying whether he was as smart as his fictional heroes, suddenly felt like a childish game. The warmth and the excitement he'd felt when he had been able to fix Tess' bike had been a thousand times better than any Sherlock Holmes denouement. That had been real, and his awkward self had been able to make a difference.

He felt Tess' piercing eyes on him, and turned.

"Where were you?" She asked with a half smile. "You looked like your thoughts were light years away."

"Just thinking."

"About Glasgow?"

"About the future. I hope to get to see you again, Tess."

She stared at him for a moment then looked away, still smiling. "Your ears are very red."

"You are annoying."

"I know. And yeah, seeing you again would be cool."

Tess was sure that her galloping heart was going to wake her mother and Phil. 'Don't creak', she mentally pleaded with the front door as she opened it. At first she thought she would never make it down the hill in that pitch-black darkness, but as her eyes adjusted to it, she was able to make out the familiar landscape.

She scampered down the slope, hugging the cardboard folder to her chest, humming a silly song to distract herself from the mysterious sounds filling the air.

More than a day later, she felt bad about her remark about Alec's ears. After their conversation under the oak she had run to her room and punched her pillow, angry with herself for being so mean. Of course she was hoping to see him again. Alec Hardy had been the first person to make her feel as if she weren't invisible in a long, long time. But he had done more: he had shown her that she could fail and yet the world wouldn't end. It was funny, because she hadn't felt as if she had let him down when she had shown him the clipping with the results of the competition.

"I would be proud of you for trying and doing your best," he had told her, and she was surprised to find out that she believed him.

Tess knew she had a bad temper, but she couldn't allow her farewell to him to be a stupid remark about his ears.

When she spotted Alec's white cottage through the black foliage, she felt a well-known prickling in her eyes. In a few hours it would be empty, his books and Mrs Hardy's bike gone forever. She let a few tears roll down her cheeks, knowing that nobody would see them.

Alec's room was on the ground floor. She tapped on the windowpane, waited, and tapped again.

He didn't take long until his huge eyes appeared behind the glass. "What the... What happened? Are you all right?"

Tess nodded. "Sorry to wake you. I didn't know what time you were going to leave tomorrow morning, and since I couldn't sleep... But I had to wait for Phil to go to bed." She knew she wasn't making much sense. "Can you sneak out a moment? I have something for you."

He climbed out of the window, and she smiled when she saw that he was wearing old-fashioned striped pyjamas. She leaned against the fence and gave him the folder with her watercolour of the lake.

Alec took it, but hesitated.

"Please, take it with you. The Fine Arts Committee was supposed to keep the entries once the bloody competition was over, but today I went back to Swainswick and asked if I could have my work back, and here it is. I know it's not good, and you don't need to frame it or anything. Just... keep it. See? I also wrote a stupid inscription on the back." Her voice broke and she covered her face in shame and frustration. Alec's silence was deafening, and she was making a fool of herself.

Gathering all the courage she had, Tess raised her eyes. His face was hard to read, but a moment later she found herself in a tight embrace. When was the last time she had been held? At Cullen's funeral, by her aunt Patricia. But even a kid like her knew that it wasn't the same; this hug was much warmer, more awkward and scary. She felt his fingers stroking her hair and she tried to relax. She knew that that hug was his parting gift for her, and Tess wondered whether there was a way to keep the memory of it with her forever.

Afterwards, they walked back to her house together, talking about mundane things and plans for the near future. They agreed to write to each other, and Alec promised he would visit her in London during the winter break. They also agreed she wouldn't come to see him leave the following morning, because that would be "too depressing and soppy."

At the door she turned, but he was already gone from view and, a few seconds later, the darkness swallowed the soft thudding of his feet on the grass.

She tried to call after him, but he didn't hear her. She couldn't raise her voice because her mother and Phil were sleeping in the room above the door, and even if she could - even if she called him back - what would she tell him?

She sat on the front steps and took in the smell of the wet grass. A small bug tried to climb over her sneaker but fell down, kicking its black legs in the air. Tess turned it with her finger and the bug scurried away. Life wasn't easy, but she hoped that Alec's road wouldn't be too bumpy and that he would hold tight to his dreams.

"Have a safe journey, Sherlock," She said in the still air. "And think about me sometimes."


	2. Chapter 2: Falling Leaves

_"I hold this to be the highest task of a bond between two people: that each should stand guard over the solitude of the other."_

\- Rainer Maria Rilke

London-Glasgow train  
September 1987

The conductor kept on staring at her. Tess' hands tingled as she checked her backpack and her pockets. Of course she had the bloody ticket, she just couldn't remember where she had put it as long as that man had his pig eyes on her. Her mother's voice resounded in her head. _Smile. When in doubt, smile. Everybody likes a pretty smile_. Tess wasn't sure whether her smile was pretty, but she did as she had been taught.

"I know it's somewhere in my backpack," she explained, looking up at the conductor.

The guy shrugged, and shifted his attention to the young woman sitting next to her. Of course the blonde girl produced her own ticket at once, but that short break allowed Tess the time to think. The book. She had put it in her paperback copy of The Dead Zone.

The conductor took her ticket with his pudgy hands, stamped it, and looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

Tess stared back at Mr Pig Eyes, her smile gone.

"Glasgow, uh? Quite a long trip."

She clutched her backpack and squared her shoulders.

After what seemed like an eternity, he gave Tess her ticket back and moved on. She kept on staring at him for a little longer, then allowed herself to slouch in her seat. She could feel her temples throbbing and her cheeks burning. Outside the window, a foreign countryside unrolled under a leaden autumn sky, farm after farm, field after field. Her battered backpack felt reassuring in her lap.

In less than five hours she would see Alec again after two years and two months. She knew that it was shallow of her thinking about these things under the circumstances, but Tess couldn't stop worrying about her appearance. The last time he had seen her she had been a cute, dainty kid, while now... She met her reflection in the window and flinched. God, she hated her bushy hair and her nose.

Again, her mother's voice. _You inherited your father's ugly nose._ As if it were something Tess had done willingly, just to upset her. As if someone would pick such a nose willingly. Her throat tightened.

A kid, she was just a stupid kid. Considering what Alec was going through, the way she looked was probably going to be the least of his worries. She dried her eyes with the back of her hand and opened her book.

Glasgow Central concourse was huge and bustling with people. She scanned the long platform as she walked it up and down, then sat on a bench under a gaudy billboard. What if he had forgotten that she was coming? She knew the name of the hospital, she could go there by herself. People kept on whirling around her, dragging bags, hurrying to catch trains, talking, hugging. A group of kids about her age sat on a near bench, gabbling in a thick Scottish accent and eating out of McDonald's' bags. After a while, a couple of boys started to look in her direction, and a girl with a huge bow in her hair backslapped one of them. The boy laughed, and when she saw him stand up, Tess leapt on her own feet and hurried away. In her haste to put as much distance as possible between her and the kids, she had ended up near the station's main entrance, but she could still see the platform where she was supposed to meet with Alec. Who at this point was worryingly late. Her nostrils caught a sweet, damp smell, and she realized she was standing in front of a flower shop. Flowers! She would buy Mrs Hardy some nice flowers.

When, a few minutes later, she emerged from the shop with a big bouquet and ten quid less in her purse, she saw a familiar lanky figure standing at the end of the rails. Baggy Pink Floyd t-shirt and hands on his hips, he looked very grownup. Her heart missed a beat. _Here we go._ She tilted her chin and walked toward him.

"Hi Alec. You are late."

"And you weren't where you were supposed to be." He sounded flustered.

"I was waiting exactly where I was supposed to, then had to move because of an annoying boy that…"

"A boy?"

"Nevermind."

Alec stared at her with a frown, as if he was gauging an alien that had just landed here. "What are those?"

He was pointing downward at her, and it took Tess a moment too long to realize that his gaze had fallen on the garish bouquet and - obviously - not on her chest. _Don't blush. Don't stutter._ "Flowers. For your mother."

"That looks more like a bloody garden. But… it's pretty, she'll like them."

They moved toward the exit and to the nearby bus stop. The station was surrounded by tall buildings and narrow streets that made her felt a bit claustrophobic.

"Do you want to give me your backpack?"

"Nah, it's light."

Their bus was about to leave, so they had to run to catch it. They sat next to each other, and Tess watched the red and blonde sandstone buildings through the dirty window. So that was where Alec lived. The green fields of the Somerset countryside seemed like a distant memory.

"Is the hospital far?"

"Nope, but we are dropping by at my aunt's place first. It's just a few stops from the hospital, and you can leave your stuff and... " He ran a hand through his unruly hair. "Use the bathroom?"

"I don't need to use the bathroom."

"Really? I truly hope you didn't use the train's loo. I recently saw a special on the telly about the sheer quantity of germs lurking on toilet seats in trains and on planes restrooms. There are certain really dangerous strains of E. coli that…"

Tess laughed. "Shut up! You are the most unpleasant guy ever. Yes, I actually used the train restroom, and besides it's already almost 2 PM, and I need to catch the 5:30 PM train back. I would like to go straight to see your mother if possible."

"But I thought the plan was for you to spend the night at my aunt's place and leave tomorrow morning! What happened?"

"Well…"

"You didn't tell your parents, did you?"

She shook her head.

"Why?"

In other circumstances all those questions would have riled her up, but there was a softness in Alec's voice the compelled her to open up to him. "Because they wouldn't have let me come."

"But I told you my aunt could talk with your mother and…"

"You don't know my mother, Alec. Actually, I tried to ask her, and after I explained to her who you and your mum were, she told me that a card would be enough." She sneered. "Silly if you think that I was almost going to ask her to come with me."

Alec sighed. "Then maybe you should have…"

"What? Given up?" Her voice caught. She knew she was being childish, but that trip had appeared so important, even romantic in her mind, and now all seemed to be reduced to a prank to sneak out from home and have a little adventure.

"I just don't want you to get in trouble. Even if you catch the 5:30 train, you won't be in London before 11 pm, and that's quite late for a girl on her own."

Tess shrugged, feigning a confidence she didn't have. "I've headed back home much later. Mum thinks I'm spending the day with my friend Janet. All I have to do is call her from the station and tell her I'll be a bit late."

"What if she calls Janet?"

"She won't."

Alec stared ahead for a while, then nodded. "I'll bring you back in time."

Southern General Hospital was an appalling conglomeration of old red bricks and modern gray concrete. As they entered the stuffy hot hall and its familiar smell of antiseptic and overcooked food hit her, Tess' stomach clenched. She knew that Mrs Hardy was terminal, so asking Alec how she was doing had seemed trivial, but now she felt her head spin and she had to stop.

"Are you sure that she wants to see me?"

"'Course." He didn't ask her why she had stopped, but sat on one of the plastic chairs lining the Oncology ward.

Tess sat next to him and busied herself by picking up some petals that had fallen from her bouquet. "Well, she barely knows me after all, and maybe she is resting now…"

"I know this is hard for you, that you're thinking about your little brother."

She stared at him. How did he know?

Alec put a hand on her back. "Listen, you don't have to do this. I can leave your wee garden in her room and tell her that she was asleep when you came. She's asleep most of the time anyway."

"No, I want to. Just… In a couple of minutes?"

"Sure."

He turned toward the hallway, but kept his hand on her back. It was a unintrusive source of warmth that allowed her to relax a bit. She had been there when Cullen had lost consciousness and had stopped being her cheeky half-brother to turn into something that she couldn't recognize. She remembered her mother cuddling him and keeping on talking to him and reading his favourite books until the end, but Tess knew that he had already been gone. This was why she hadn't cried the night he had died. She had said her goodbye days before, when she had brought him Boo, her favourite stuffed animal, and had put it on his bed, among the dozens of toys he had received. She didn't know what happened after death, but imagining her old Boo accompanying Cullen had brought her some peace. She should have been better at consoling her mother, though. Shared tears and hugs would have made her mother feel a bit better, and she hadn't been able to provide them. Her plan had been to do that at least for Alec, but Tess hadn't expected it to be so hard.

She took a deep shaky breath. "Is your aunt ok?"

"What do you mean?"

She knew that Alec had moved to his aunt Kate's home since Mrs Hardy had been hospitalized. "I mean, is she nice? You two get along well?"

"Yes, I like her. But she's already struggling with a crappy job and two young children, I don't want to be a burden to her a day more than I have to."

Tess turned to look at him.

"I'm taking a three-year ordinary degree, then I'll enroll in the police."

It made sense, with his loyal, protective nature and his love for mystery books. "You'll make a good officer."

"You think?" Alec took his hand away from her back and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "I don't know whether to tell mum or not. It's not exactly a dream career, and she wanted me to be a doctor."

"I'm sure she wants you to become whatever makes you happy."

He huffed. "What about you? I was surprised when you wrote me that you weren't going to go to an art school."

"It seems I wasn't talented enough." The truth was that neither Phil nor her father had been willing to pay for the art school fees, but she hadn't minded much. Most of her efforts at drawing and painting had been lead by the will to please her mother, and now it was like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. She stood, holding out her hand at him. "Let's go?"

Alec took her hand and didn't move, but Tess saw that he was doing his best not to smile.

She pulled and tugged at his arm, and when he finally got up she lost her balance. He was swift to put his other arm around her waist to prevent her from tumbling to the floor. Heat rose to her cheeks. "Idiot."

He disentangled himself at once, mumbling an apology and heading toward his mother's room.

Right before they got there, Tess clutched a fistful of his t-shirt from behind.

"What now?"

She handed him the flowers. "Please, give them to her yourself."

He stooped a bit to look into her eyes. "Is Tess Henchard being bashful?"

Since there was no point in pretending, she just frowned and nodded. She was making a fool of herself.

Alec's chocolate eyes softened, but instead of taking the bouquet he grabbed her free hand. "Come on, she'll love it. She's always enjoyed gardening."

Mrs Hardy was alert and kind, and - as Alec had predicted - she seemed to sincerely appreciate Tess' little gift. She sent her son to fetch a vase, and instructed him to put it on her bedside table. They talked for a while about mundane stuff like hospital life and gossip about fellow patients, and Tess got to know some funny episodes from Alec's childhood. She also had to lie about her stay in Glasgow, since Mrs Hardy seemed as protective as her son, and she didn't want her to worry about her sneaking out of home or having to travel back at night. That elicited a raised eyebrow from Alec that she did her best to ignore.

Helen Hardy's bout of energy was short lived though, and after about half an hour she started to talk more slowly and got drowsy. With a tenderness that Tess had never seen before in him, Alec hurried to lower her bed and adduce an excuse, Tess' hunger, to end their visit. Mrs Hardy gave Tess a weak hug and a warm smile, and told Alec to take her somewhere nice for dinner and to remember to have some food himself.

On the lift, they both fell silent. Tess tried not to think that she would probably never see Alec's mother again. "So, where are we going to eat?"

Alec checked his watch. "We've got less than two hours, so it's either the hospital cafeteria or somewhere near the station." He sounded tired.

"We can have a coffee here and I can head back to the station alone, I'll just need to catch the same bus in the opposite direction, right?"

They were now standing in front of the cafeteria, whose plastic tables were empty at that hour, except for a man hooked to an IV pole.

"Yeah, but this place is terrible. I know a nice wee café right in front of the Central Station; if we hurry we should make it in time." He headed toward the exit, and Tess couldn't help but smile as she followed him.

The nice café was a dingy pub called The Kelburne, with wooden tables and a carpeted floor with a tartan pattern. Tess' eyebrows shot upwards, but as soon as she sat at a square table near the window, the smell of fried onions and chips made her stomach gurgle. They both ordered a double cheeseburger and a coke, and, as soon as the waiter left, she realized that she really needed to take a trip to the loo. She excused herself and went down the few steps that led to the restroom.

Just to come back a few seconds later.

"The door is broken. I need you to check it for me."

"Errr, I would rather not, honestly. Come on, this place is empty, nobody is going to burst in on you."

Tess glared at him. "Well, thank you very much."

He rolled his eyes and stood. "Bloody hell. Come on."

The bathroom was clean but minuscule. "Don't listen!"

"Listen to what?"

"Anything. Talk to me so I know you aren't listening."

"What should I tell ya?"

"Anything."

"Bloody hell Tess, just hurry up. I'm starving."

Afterwards they ate in silence. The food was good, but Tess felt anxiety broiling in the pit of her stomach. It was ten to five. She had been postponing that moment since her arrival, but it was now or never. "I've got something for you." With a movement that she hoped was swift, she took a wrapped gift out of her backpack and put it on the sticky table.

Alec's gaze moved up from his cheeseburger, to the gift, and finally to her. "Really?"

The idea to give him a memento of happier times had come to Tess since Alec had written her that his mother was sick. She had used one of the pictures she had taken that summer with her point and shoot Canon as model for the watercolour of the Hardys' cottage, to which she had added Alec mum's lilac bike by memory. After three failed attempts, she had managed to put together a presentable painting and frame it. "Really. Just please, open it after I've left."

"Ok. But hey?"

She had to look at him.

His eyes were earnest and his earlobes red. "Thank you. It was nice to have you here today."

This time Tess didn't tease him about his ears though. "Yeah. I'm happy I got to see you again."

Alec nodded, and they both found something on their plates to focus on.

When they left, the street lamps were already on, and the air smelled of night. The phone box from where she called home had yellow leaves stuck to its dirty glass. She invented a teenage drama, a breakup between her friend Janet and her boyfriend, to justify the fact that she was going to be back late that night, and her mother bought it with weary resignation.

The station was even more chaotic than when she had arrived. Everybody looked tired, and a bulky woman jostled her in a hurry to get who knows where. Alec took her hand as they walked to her platform. Suddenly everything seemed too big to Tess: the station with its dome of glass and iron, the unknown city, the forces of life and death.

The train for London Victoria was already there, but they still had a few minutes. There were so many things that she wanted to tell him, but the words didn't come. She just clutched his hand then, and he clutched hers back.

"Call me when you get home."

"Okay."

"And be careful on the train."

"Yes dad."

He smiled, then got serious and put his hands on her shoulders.

Tess' heart fluttered in her chest.

The loudspeaker announced that the train was about to leave, and they both started.

Alec squeezed her shoulders and lowered his eyes.

A few moments later she was on the train, waving at him from the window.

The bus was crowded with people going back home after work. By the time he arrived at the hospital, fat dark clouds had gathered in the sky, pushed by a cold wind. Fallen leaves crunched under his feet.

He should have kissed her.

Visiting hour was almost over, but the nurse let him in anyway. His mother was fast asleep. He took his usual chair near her bed, then changed his mind and decided to sit in the hallway, where he had been with Tess just a couple of hours earlier. On the floor there were still a couple of rose petals from her bouquet, together with a small lilac freesia.

He unwrapped the gift carefully, and stared at the painting for a long time. It had the bright colors of summer: green, blue, white. And his mother's lilac bike, just like the discarded flower on the floor. Alec closed his eyes and remembered the green of the Somerset countryside and the feeling of sun on his skin, then picked up the freesia and put it in the notebook he always carried with him. The pencil in his hand seemed too cheap for his thoughts, but he tried to put them into words nevertheless. At worst, that was going to be just another of the many letters he had never found the courage to send her.

He took a deep breath and started to write.


End file.
